How to configure a dashboard (from an old one)?

I use Home Assistant for 6 or so years now (I do not even remember when I started to use this wonderful solution), mostly as a state machine, a backend for automation, and the source for my own dashboard.

I used Lovelace with some basic settings to have a backup switchboard.

I am seriously considering moving to Lovelace now and am asking for recommendations and advice regarding the way to configure it. For context, I work in IT and development so the more technical, the better.

Over the years, I noticed that HA is getting more and more front-end configurable (groups are probably the biggest chink I have still left) and I see that the way Lovelace is managed has changed considerably as well. Specifically:

  • I noticed that when adding a card today, I was notified that I do not use Lovelace in “storage” mode. What does this mean?

  • I have in configuration.yaml entries such as

lovelace:
  mode: yaml
  resources:
    - url: /hacsfiles/rgb-light-card/card.js
      type: module
    - url: /hacsfiles/lovelace-auto-entities/auto-entities.js
      type: module
(...)

but in the documentation of the card it was mentioned that for manual installation (as opposed to using HACS) I need to add them to lovelace-ui.yaml. Should the modules still be added manually when using HACS?

  • I have both YAML based panels, as well as ones that are created though drag and drop. Which one, today, is the most useful (I am not afraid to have pure YAML configurations, though if this is the same as using the UI configuration I do not want to make my life difficult)

To summarize: for someone technical who has used HA for a long time, but is building a dashboard just now, what is the best approach?